The following description of the business of Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation should be read in conjunction with the information included elsewhere in this annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2015. We refer to Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation ("ACRE") together with our subsidiaries as "we," "us," "Company," or "our," unless we specifically state otherwise or the context indicates otherwise. We refer to our manager, Ares Commercial Real Estate Management LLC, as our "Manager" or "ACREM" and the parent company of our Manager, Ares Management, L.P., together with its consolidated subsidiaries, as "Ares Management." GENERAL We are a specialty finance company that is primarily focused on directly originating, managing and servicing a diversified portfolio of commercial real estate ("CRE") debt-related investments for our own account.